BIOL10000 Year 1 Tutorials

The School of Biological Sciences Tutorial Programme

All Level 1 SBS students are enrolled in the tutorial unit BIOL10000. Tutorials will provide you with knowledge and expertise related to your degree programme as well as transferable skills. The tutorial programme includes small group tutorials and plenary sessions. In the first semester, tutorials are also linked an online unit (Writing and Referencing Skills (WRS); BIOL10741) that will help you to improve your written communication skills. Figure 1 shows the components of the Year 1 Tutorial Unit.

Figure 1. Tutorials in Year 1 include small group and plenary sessions. The Writing and Referencing Skills (WRS; BIOL10741) unit complements tutorial activities and must be passed in order to pass the tutorial unit.

Small group tutorials will take place with other students from your degree programme and your Academic Tutor. They may be held in person or online. Please note that times for your small group tutorials will be arranged by your Academic Tutor and will not appear on your “myManchester” timetable.

Plenary sessions will be delivered by specialists to larger groups of students from multiple degree programmes. This format ensures consistent delivery of information to students, and the plenary sessions generally cover topics that are relevant to all SBS students. You should check the dates for plenary sessions on the tutorial Blackboard site (BIOL10000), as your Tutor will not remind you of these. Some plenary sessions have associated pre-session work, which should be completed in advance of your timetabled session.

The tutorial programme builds year-on-year and focuses on 4 major strands of skills: communication (written and oral); professional skills; experimental reporting; and employability, as shown in Figure 2. Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs) for the Level 1 tutorials are available here. The activities in Years 2 and 3 build on the skills you acquire in Year 1.

Figure 2. Summary of the topics you can expect to cover in small group tutorials (top) and plenary sessions (bottom). Your Tutor and Programme-Director may, at their discretion, alter the content of your tutorials.

Tutorial Assignment Deadlines

Table 1 shows the deadlines for tutorial assignments common to all degree programmes. Note that you may have additional, program specific, deadlines for assignments that will be set by your Academic Tutor.

Assignment	Deadlines (usually Thursdays at 16:00)	Marks	Submission	Feedback type
Semester 1
Scientist Summary	TBA with Academic Tutor (week 1)	0-100%	TBA with Academic Tutor	Formative
Frontiers of Science Summary	29/10/20	0-100%	Assessments area BIOL10000 Bb	Formative
Semester 1 Essay – Draft	19/11/20	Plagiarism report only	Assessments area BIOL10000 Bb	Formative
Semester 1 Essay – Final	3/12/20	Pass/Fail	Assessments area BIOL10000 Bb	Formative
Semester 1 Poster	TBA	0-100% (33% of mark for BIOL10000)	Poster Session	Summative
Semester 2
Semester 2 Essay	18/3/21	0-100% (33% of mark for BIOL10000)	Assessments area BIOL10000 Bb	Summative
Programme-specific assignment	TBA with Academic Tutor	0-100% (34% of mark for BIOL10000)	TBA with Academic Tutor	Summative
Semester 2 Poster Presentation*	TBA with Academic Tutor (week 11 or 12)	0-100%	TBA with Academic Tutor	Summative (BIOL10412 or 10422)

Table 1. Year 1 tutorial assignments. Additional assignments may be specified by your Tutor. TBA = to be arranged; Bb = Blackboard. The BIOL10000 Bb site can be accessed here. Formative feedback: this is intended to highlight areas that you need to work on and any marks awarded are not included in the overall mark for BIOL10000. Summative feedback: also helps you to improve your work and marks awarded count towards the total for BIOL10000 or another unit. *Students enrolled in a Field course unit do not prepare a poster in Semester 2.

Table 2 shows the deadlines for the Writing and Referencing Skills unit. The first module, “Academic Malpractice” will be open from Welcome Week, with a deadline at the end of week 2. Gaining a score of 100% in this module is required to gain access to the other modules. The remaining modules can be completed any time after this date and before their respective deadlines.

Assessment	Available from:	Deadline week	Deadline dates (Fridays at 16:00)
Academic Malpractice	Before Teaching Week 1	2	16/10/20
Essential Language Skills	Once Academic Malpractice module has been passed with a score of 100%	4	30/10/20
Academic Style		5	6/11/20
Text Handling		6	13/11/20
Referencing the right way		7	20/11/20
Planning ahead		8	27/11/20
Performing a search		9	4/12/20
Endnote online		10	11/12/20

Table 2. Writing and Referencing Skills unit (BIOL10741) deadlines. Weeks correspond to Semester 1 teaching weeks, where week 1 begins on Monday 5/10/2020.

Table 3 shows the Year 1 plenary sessions, indicating those where pre-session work must be completed. You will find timetabling information, descriptions of the sessions, ILOs, and instructions for pre-session work in the relevant folder in the “Plenary Sessions” area of the BIOL10000 Bb site.

Plenary title	Teaching Week	Pre-session work	Who must attend
Semester 1
Understanding University Assessments	1	YES	All Year 1 students
Frontiers of Science	3	No	All Year 1 students
How to Write a Scientific Essay	6	This is an online plenary, which must be completed by W6.	All Year 1 students
Semester 2
Experimental Reporting: Lab poster	4	This is an online plenary, which must be completed by W4.	Students enrolled in BIOL10412 or BIOL10422
~~Experimental Reporting: Field Course~~	7	~~Recordings to view in advance of the live Q&A session in W7.~~ CANCELLED	~~Students enrolled in a Field Course Unit~~
Employability: Make the most of your First Year	8	No	All Year 1 students

Table 3. Year 1 plenary sessions. If you are enrolled in BIOL10412 or BIO10422 you must access the ‘Experimental reporting: Lab Poster’ plenary online via the BIOL10412 or BIO10422 Blackboard site.

What are the roles of your Academic Tutor and Academic Advisor?

Your Academic Tutor will arrange your small group tutorials and mark your tutorial assessments. Your Academic Tutor will help you to:

Develop skills and knowledge relevant to your degree subject during tutorials. Your tutorial studies will help you to put the information given in lectures and practicals into the context of your degree programme.
Enhance your employability by helping you acquire a range of transferable skills. These include skills in written and oral communication, organisation of information, personal interaction, teamwork and the use of information technology. Employers value these ‘transferable skills’. Tutorials will also help you learn to manage your time during your degree course and improve your revision and examination techniques. A detailed list of skills valued by employers and suggestions for how you can develop them is provided in Appendix 1.

Every student in the School is assigned an Academic Advisor. In Year 1, your Academic Tutor will also be your Academic Advisor. Your Academic Advisor is normally the same person throughout your course and is your main link to the School and the University. They can advise you on academic matters, personal problems (if needed), and can provide references when you are applying for jobs. Further information about Academic Advisors and One-to-One Academic Advisor Meetings is in the First Level Handbook.

Assessment

Your tutorial assignments are listed in Table 1. These will be marked by your Academic Tutor and returned to you with feedback that will allow you to improve your work for the next assignment.

In order to pass the Tutorial Unit, three separate elements are required:

You must have satisfactory attendance at small-group tutorial and plenary sessions.
You have to obtain an average mark of at least 40% in your tutorial assignments.
You must pass the Writing and Referencing Skills unit (BIOL10741).

Tutorials are an important part of the attendance requirements for your degree course and compensation for partial failure of unit examinations is available only to students who have passed their tutorial unit. In addition, students who fail their tutorial unit due to poor marks or absences will be removed from Industrial/Professional Experience, Language or MSci programmes and are required to complete an extended essay during the summer vacation. For further details see the First Level Handbook

Failure of the Tutorial Unit

Level 1 students can fail the tutorial unit:

by having more than one unexcused absence from small-group tutorials or plenary sessions, OR
by getting a mark below 40% in tutorial assignments, averaged over the two semesters, OR
by failing the Writing and Referencing Skills unit (BIOL10741).

Formatting of Tutorial Assignments

All written tutorial assessments apart from posters should be formatted in the following way: Arial 10pt font, 2.5cm margins, 1.5 line spacing. Page limit and referencing style for each assignment will be specified by your Academic Tutor.

How to submit tutorial assignments

Most assignments should be submitted via the Assessments area of the BIOL10000 unit Blackboard site. There is a submission folder for each assignment, which contains further instructions on how to submit. Your Academic Tutor may also advise you to submit certain assignments directly to them, or via a different folder in the BIOL10000 site so please follow their instructions. Late submission of tutorial assessments will be penalised with a deduction of 10% of the marks per day (or part thereof, including weekends and holidays) beyond the deadline.

Attendance

Attendance at small group tutorials and plenary sessions is compulsory. More than one unexcused absence from either small-group tutorials or plenary sessions over the academic year will result in failure of the tutorial unit; exclusion from language, MSci and industrial placement programmes; loss of compensation for exams; and a summer re-sit essay assignment. Additional unexcused absences from tutorials may lead to the issuing of a formal warning letter. Unexcused absences may have detrimental effects on decisions on progression to subsequent years of your degree programme, or even lead to exclusion from study in the Faculty. For further information on this and other related matters, please read the relevant sections of the First Level Handbook.

Small group tutorials

Attendance will usually be monitored by your Academic Tutor. In the case of student-led tutorials, where students meet in the absence of their tutor, attendance is also compulsory and will be recorded by a person chosen in advance and passed on to the Academic Tutor.

If you are absent from a tutorial or unable to complete a tutorial assignment due to illness, make sure you follow the guidelines on ill health set out in the First Level Handbook. Importantly, you must alert the Student Support Office and your Academic Tutor no later than the day and start time of your tutorial session AND submit a self-certification form and/or medical documentation promptly to the Student Support Office. It is your responsibility to provide this information.

If you are unable to attend for any other good reason, you must supply documentary evidence to your Academic Tutor strongly supporting your reasons for absence.

Plenary sessions

Plenary session attendance is compulsory and failure to attend a Plenary Session will count as a tutorial absence. It is your responsibility to check the ‘Plenary Sessions’ Area on the BIOL10000 Blackboard site for information about timetabling and attendance. Some Plenary Titles will run more than once. In this case you only need to attend one session, but it MUST be the one specified for your degree programme on the BIOL10000 Blackboard site. If the session allocated to your degree programme clashes with a language or other unit, you may be permitted attend the other session but only by prior arrangement (at least 1 working day’s notice) with the student support office.

If you are ill on the day of a plenary session, you must contact the student support office prior to the start of the plenary session in order to obtain an excused absence. Contacting your Academic Tutor instead of the student support office will result in your absence being unexcused.

Small Group Tutorial Activities and Plenary Sessions

The content of small group tutorials will depend on your degree programme and your Academic Tutor, but you should expect to participate in most of the activities listed below.

Semester 1: Developing Communication Skills

Introduction and Semester 1 Tutorial Schedule

Your small group tutorials, the Writing and Referencing Skills Unit and the tutorial plenary sessions all work together in semester 1 to develop your skills in communicating science. Activities and assignments that are linked to small group tutorials, plenaries and/or the WRS unit are indicated by the appropriate logo, as per Figure 1. An outline schedule for Semester 1 is shown in Table 4.

Table 4. Semester 1 Outline Tutorial Schedule. Your Tutor or Programme Director may provide an alternative schedule at their discretion.

Teaching Week	Small-group Tutorials	Plenary Sessions	BIOL10000 submission DEADLINES	BIOL10741 Writing and Referencing Skills DEADLINES
1	1 Tutor-led tutorial	Understanding University Assessments	Submit summary of scientist (to Tutor).
2	1 Tutor-led tutorial			Academic Malpractice
3	1 Student-led tutorial to be held by week 4	Frontiers of Science (FoS)
4	1 Student-led tutorial to be held by week 4		Submit FoS summary. Thursday 16:00	Essential Language Skills
5	2 Tutor-led tutorials in weeks 5-7			Academic Style
6		How to write a Scientific Essay [Online]	Attendance quiz for Scientific Essay Plenary	Text Handling
7			Submit draft essay for plagiarism report only. Thursday 16:00	Referencing the right way
8	1 Tutor-led tutorial			Planning ahead
9	1 Student-led tutorial		Submit final essay. Thursday 16:00	Performing a search
10	Semester 1 Posters		Poster presentation. Date TBA.	Endnote
11	1 Tutor-led tutorial

This schedule doesn’t contain the dates and times of your small group tutorial sessions, which will be arranged by your Academic Tutor. You should ensure that you record times of your tutorials and the assignment deadlines, as these will not appear in your “My Manchester” calendar. More information about each plenary session, including details of pre-session work, will also be available on the BIOL10000 Blackboard site in advance of the plenary.

BIOL10741 Writing and Referencing Skills (WRS) Unit

This compulsory online unit is available on Blackboard. It provides resources to help you with written communication, scientific referencing, and avoiding academic malpractice. These skills are essential for the year 1 tutorial assessments, including essays and lab reports and will form the basis for written assessments during your time at University. A PDF covering the writing skills content is available to download to help with future assignments.

Please ensure that you read the BIOL10741 course content pages on Blackboard for information on the running of the course. You MUST achieve 100% in the Academic Malpractice module AND achieve an average score of 70% or above for the seven WRS modules to pass BIOL10741 and therefore the tutorial unit. You will receive a mark for the WRS unit from the seven WRS assessments.

The “Academic Malpractice” module will be available from Welcome Week and must be completed by 4 pm on Friday 16th October (week 2). The “Academic Malpractice” module must be passed with a score of 100% to pass and gain access to the rest of the WRS course. The remaining WRS modules and assessments can then be completed at any time before their respective deadlines (Table 2). Submission deadlines are 4pm on the Fridays of weeks 4-10. Extensions are not permitted.

Queries about the BIOL10741 WRS unit should be directed to the Unit Coordinator, Lindsay MacDougall. Technical queries, including problems accessing the course, need to be reported to the eLearning team via the dedicated link on Blackboard (a tab, marked technical support, can be found in the menu on the left-hand side of the BIOL10741 Blackboard unit site). Queries on the library modules (5-7 on database searches and EndNote) should be addressed to uml.e-learning@manchester.ac.uk (for technical queries) or uml.teachingandlearning@manchester.ac.uk (for queries on content).

Semester 1 Tutorial Activities and Plenary Sessions

Communication

Understanding University Assessments Plenary

This plenary session will familiarise you with assessments at University, including marking schemes and feedback. Further information is available in the Plenary Sessions area of the BIOL10000 Bb site. There is pre-session work to complete in advance of this plenary. Please ensure that you attend the session specified for your degree programme and follow the instructions to record your attendance.

“Avoiding Plagiarism” Activity

Plagiarism is a type of Academic Malpractice that you need to understand and avoid. Plagiarism is the use (theft) of someone else’s work without proper acknowledgement, presenting the material as if it were one’s own. It is totally unacceptable in any form. The First Level Handbook gives further information on plagiarism, and the University’s guidance academic malpractice can be viewed here. It is important to note that ‘self-plagiarism’, where parts of your own previously submitted work are re-used, is also unacceptable.

In Semester 1, you will do an activity with your tutorial group on how to recognise and avoid plagiarism. The first module in the Writing and Referencing Skills unit will also teach you about plagiarism and other forms of academic malpractice. An online resource with more information on plagiarism and how to avoid it is available via MLE.

Later in Semester 1 you will have to opportunity to use the University’s plagiarism detection software on an essay that you will submit.

Any first-year student found to have plagiarised work will have to attend an interview with a panel of academic staff. The panel will determine a suitable penalty, which may include a mark of zero for the assignment or for the course unit. Penalties for Academic Malpractice are increasingly severe in later years of the programme!

Scientific Summary Assignments and Frontiers of Science Plenary

Effective summarisation is essential for lecture note-taking, exam preparation, and written communication. In semester 1 you will write two summaries:

Weeks 0/1: You will write a summary about a scientist related to your degree programme. Further guidance on this activity will be provided by your Academic Tutor.
Weeks 3/4: You will write a summary of a plenary lecture given by a leading researcher from the Faculty. This is the “Frontiers of Science” plenary session, and it will be aimed at a general audience, so don’t worry if you know little about the subject before you attend. Following the lecture, you should summarize the content of the talk in less than 1 A4 page, following the general tutorial formatting guidelines and the assignment brief. Your summary should be submitted via the Assessments area of the BIOL10000 Blackboard site. Your Academic Tutor will provide feedback on this summary but his assignment does not count towards the tutorial unit mark.

Semester 1 Essay writing Assignment and “How to Write a Scientific Essay Plenary”

Success in every degree programme involves learning how to organise your thoughts and communicate an understanding of a topic. An essay is not simply a series of facts, but a structured presentation of a logical argument, backed up with evidence, to establish a point of view. Writing an essay therefore requires careful research and planning, which you will learn how to do through small group tutorial activities, the “How to write a Scientific Essay” plenary session, and the Writing and Referencing Skills Unit. The WRS PDF also has “A practical Guide to Writing Essays”, which you may find useful.

In Semester 1 you will complete an essay on a topic selected by your Academic Tutor and Programme Director. Your Academic Tutor will specify the length of the essay, which should be formatted according to the guidelines for tutorial work. To facilitate your understanding of plagiarism, how to detect and eliminate it from your work, a draft essay will be submitted in week 7 through Blackboard and put through the University’s plagiarism detection software Turnitin. Once the draft essay submission deadline has passed, you will be able to see the plagiarism report on your essay, which you should save as a PDF for future reference. If necessary, you should then edit your essay to eliminate plagiarised material. Even if no edits are needed, the final essay must nonetheless be re-submitted in week 9. The final version of your essay will also go through a plagiarism check, but this will only be for staff use and will be considered when your essay is marked. If you do not submit a draft of the essay in week 7 you may still submit a final version for assessment, but you will not be allowed to see the plagiarism report on your final version. The final essay will be marked by your Academic Tutor, who will provide feedback by week 11. Late (if not approved by the Student Support Office) or non-submission of the final essay will result in a Fail for this assignment. You should save a copy of your feedback comments for consideration when submitting your second tutorial essay in semester 2 and for other future assignments. Instructions for how to view feedback are available here.

You will find the submission site and instructions for submitting your essay in the Assessments area of the BIOL10000 Blackboard site. Should you have any technical difficulties uploading your file you should submit an eLearning enquiry through Blackboard (a tab can be found on the left-hand side of the tutorial unit site) or contact the Student Support Office.

Semester 1 Poster Assignment

Scientists often present their work at conferences in the form of a poster to communicate key aspects of their work in a visually appealing and informative manner. Constructing a good poster is a challenging task. It should allow the viewer to understand the topic, without having to spend a long time sifting through details. It should also be eye-catching, to attract the attention of anyone passing.

Towards the end of Semester 1, you will choose a topic for a group poster in consultation with your Academic Tutor. As part of a group, you will research the topic, design, and prepare your poster. Further information and instructions will be provided during Semester 1. General information on poster preparation is included in Appendix 2.

Semester 2: Developing Programme-specific Skills

Introduction and Semester 2 Tutorial Schedule

As in Semester 1, this schedule doesn’t contain the dates and times of your small group tutorial sessions, which will be arranged by your Academic Tutor.

Teaching Week	Small-group Tutorials	Plenary Sessions	BIOL10000 submission DEADLINES (Thursdays 16:00)	Related submission DEADLINES (not BIOL10000)
1	1 Tutor-led tutorial
2	3 Tutor-led and 1- 2 student-led tutorials before the end of week 7
3
4		Experimental Reporting: lab poster. Online plenary with a completion deadline in W4.	Complete “Experimental Reporting: Lab Poster” online plenary on BIOL10412/22 Bb sites.	Complete lab poster online plenary & quiz on BIOL10412/22 Bb site. Thursday 16:00
5
6			Submit S2 Essay.
7
EASTER
8	1 Tutor-led tutorial	Employability: Make the most of your First Year
9	1 Tutor-led tutorial
10	1 Student-led tutorial			Submit lab poster on BIOL10412/22 Bb site. Thursday 16:00
11	1 Tutor-led tutorial
12	1 Tutor-led tutorial

Table 5. Semester 2 Suggested Tutorial Schedule. Your Tutor or Programme Director may provide an alternative schedule at their discretion. See Table 3 for details of which students should complete each of the Experimental Reporting plenaries.

Semester 2 Tutorial Activities and Plenary Sessions

Communication

Semester 2 Essay Assignment

In Semester 1 you were introduced to the basic process of essay writing through the “How to Write a Scientific Essay” plenary, the Writing and Referencing Skills Unit, work in small group tutorials, and preparing the Semester 1 Essay. In Semester 2, you will extend and develop the skills you learnt in Semester 1 by researching and writing an essay of relevance to your degree programme. Your Academic Tutor will provide details of the subject, length and assessment process. You will be expected to avoid plagiarism and to apply the principles taught in Semester 1 relating to references. You will not be given the chance to see the plagiarism report and make edits to this essay. The essay you submit must be the final version, which will then be electronically checked for plagiarism. Submission is via the Assessments area of the BIOL10000 Blackboard site.

Experimental Reporting

Lab poster or Field Course Report Assignment and Plenaries

In semester 2, students enrolled on lab-based practical units (BIOL10412/10422) will work in a small group to produce a scientific poster describing one of the experiments. Online resources describing these assignments, along with the marking criteria, will be available on the Blackboard sites of the respective practical units. Generic guidelines for writing lab reports can also be found in the WRS unit (BIOL10741) PDF.

Lab-based students will be put into groups of 2-4 by their Academic Tutor. Each group will produce a scientific poster in the form of a PowerPoint slide and will answer questions about its content during a question and answer tutorial session. There will be an online Experimental Reporting: Lab poster plenary delivered via the BIOL10412/10422 Blackboard sites to help with preparing the poster.

Due to changes in the organisation of Field Courses the plenary originally planned for teaching week 7 has been cancelled. Field course students will be provided with information regarding their assessment during their field course unit.

Professional Skills

Programme-specific Assignments

Your group will complete one of the following types of programme-specific assignments. Details will be provided by your Academic Tutor.

Data analysis/Problem Solving

These activities are designed to complement skills acquired in the Practical Module BIOL10401 and will focus on quantitative and analytical problem-solving tasks specific to your degree programme.

Group-based learning (GBL) sessions

GBL provides a means of developing team-working skills while exploring a topical issue relevant to your degree subject (see Appendix 3 for guidelines on running a GBL activity). Your group will choose or be allocated a subject for investigation, in consultation with your Academic Tutor. As a group, you then research the subject, deciding amongst yourselves who should do what and the approach that should be taken. On completion of your research, all members of the group should contribute to the final outcome, which could be an oral presentation, written article or poster. The performance of the group will be assessed by your Academic Tutor and this will contribute to your overall tutorial mark. Note that, if you are asked to give a short talk, the My Learning Essentials website has some excellent resources to help with preparing and delivering oral presentations.

Employability

What are Employability Skills?

Employability skills are the skills needed in working environments. Employability skills can be very specific and technical, like understanding HPLC or how to run a PCR; or they can be general, such as demonstrating effective communication skills.

Why are employability skills important in year 1?

Employability skills are always important and you will already have developed a range of skills from your experiences that have led you to The University of Manchester. If in year 1 you’re looking for a part-time job or summer internship, or plan to go on placement later on in your course, you will be asked to write about and discuss your employability skills during application and interview. The sooner you have the chance to build your range of skills and reflect on these – the better.

What skills will I get this year?

In year 1 the employability focus is about settling in and trying new things. You will experience a lot of new subjects, people and activities. We want to help you make the most of your time here, and getting off to a good start is a key part of that. To help with this, there will be an Employability plenary session entitled “Make the most of your First Year” in Week 8. For a specific run-down of all the employability skills you can gain this year check out Appendix 1: Employability; your module descriptions also detail the skills you will have the chance to develop.

Keep a record of your employability skills

It’s worth thinking about how you can keep a record of the skills and new experiences you develop during the year. One way is to create a ‘living CV’ which acts like a list or summary of all the things you’ve done and what you’ve learnt. The benefit of this approach is when you come to write your CV to send out then you have all the evidence in one place. Typical headings would be education, jobs, volunteering, positions of responsibility and interests. More information on CVs can be found in the Careers Service CV guide.

The Careers Service

The Careers Service can help you with all your career needs.

Common queries from first year students are:

How can I get work experience or a part-time job?
I don’t like my course, what else can I do?
How can I find out about career options?
I don’t know what I want to do.

The Biology, Medicine and Health Careers Consultants are: Sarah Ashworth, Amanda Conway, Suzanne Creeber, and Jane Whitmore – you’ll most probably see Suzanne or Sarah as they are the linked consultants for School of Biological Sciences. We offer a personalised service with booked appointments with specialist advisers, an application advice service, a specialist “over the counter” information service, and 24-hour access to careers information and vacancies through the website. For full details of how to find the Careers Service in The Atrium, booking and a wealth of help and support visit the web site.

Royal Literary Fund Writing Fellows

The Royal Literary Fund Writing Fellows are professional, published authors whose role is to help you strengthen your writing.

Plan your study time.
Focus your reading for essay, dissertation or thesis writing.
Express your ideas more clearly.
Answer grammar and punctuation questions.
Discover reading to improve your writing and editing skills.
Increase your writing skills with the aim of improving your grades.
Improve any academic writing – essays, reports, theses, dissertations, book chapters.

Further information about the writers’ expertise, and instructions for appointment booking are available on the BIOL10000 Blackboard site

Help with English Language Skills

Should you need help with English language skills, you can contact the University Language Centre.

The PASS Scheme

PASS (Peer Assisted Study Sessions) is a peer support scheme designed to provide pastoral and academic support for all first-year students. PASS is run by students with the support of the School and a dedicated staff coordinator: Dr Maggy Fostier. The aim is to help 1st year students become independent learners by working together under the guidance of higher year students (PASS leaders). All information about PASS is on the SBS-PASS Blackboard site, which you can find by scrolling down to the Communities area in the page listing your courses.

PASS sessions

Small group learning: Each Yr1 student is part of a PASS group of 10-15 students of the same or similar degree programme, with two PASS leaders. You will be given a group space on SBS-PASS Blackboard to hang out and share resources.
Weekly sessions: Following a ‘live’ team building session in Welcome Week and an interactive ‘induction’ in week 1, the group will meet via zoom in weeks 2-11 for 50 min (timetabled) to study together.
Tailored content: We have activity sets on SBS-Blackboard designed to make you work collaboratively to develop and test your understanding, explore new ideas, or develop skills. Following your vote, your leaders will select 2-3 activities and make time for any queries about student life or coping with a new way of learning.
Your PASS Leaders are higher year SBS undergraduates trained in group management, facilitation and mentoring techniques. They will share their experience (including that of remote learning), organise the group work and ensure the discussion is collaborative and productive for learning.
You will learn by working in a safe environment with your Yr1 peers through specifically designed activities (from basic to advanced level). You will listen, explain, question, solve problems, try things out, explore, exchange, share, thus gradually becoming independent learners (i.e. independent from staff), which is required at University.
PASS leaders facilitate and encourage; they won’t teach or give answers – most activities don’t have a model answer anyway. Leaders will help you make the most of the activities and discussions, and if you get stuck, they will guide you to find ways to move forward, sharing their experience where relevant.

Student Feedback

In order to help us maximise the benefits that you gain from tutorials, we need feedback from you, both on the tutorial activities and on your Academic Tutor’s performance. For this purpose, you will be asked to complete a unit survey at the end of each semester. It is important for us to have your opinion, as these surveys will be used to determine how tutorials are constructed and conducted in future years. Details of how to access/complete the survey will be given to you each semester.

Appendix 1: Employability

This table outlines some transferable skills that employers seek and ideas for developing these so that you can use them for job applications and in interviews in the future.

What are employers looking for?	What does that mean?	How can you develop this skill?
Ability to articulate what you have to offer	Reflect on the skills you have gained throughout your tutorials and other units. Develop good communication skills so that you can talk about your skills and provide evidence that you have them to potential employers.	Reflection: keep updating your CV and keeping a record of new skills. Communication Skills Oral presentations (tutorials; some lecture units; lab meetings). Essays (tutorials; many lecture units). Debates (some tutorials; some lecture units).
Creativity & innovation	Being able to come up with new ideas, approaches and solutions. Thinking ‘outside the box’ and being able to suggest new/improved ways of doing things.	You will have the opportunity to be creative in terms of your approach to assignments – e.g., ideas for poster topics in tutorials. Your final year project will present opportunities to be innovative in overcoming obstacles.
Critical thinking	Being able to analyse an idea or a piece of work objectively and weigh up its strengths and weaknesses. Recognise your own biases and be open to new ideas if evidence supports them.	Essays and oral presentations will include structured presentations of a logical argument. You will read and critically analyse primary literature in tutorials, and build on these skills during your dissertation and literature review.
Cultural awareness & sensitivity	Experience of interacting with individuals from a range of different backgrounds and ability to adapt your approach to suit the needs of the people you are working with.	We have a diverse staff and student body so you are likely to interact with individuals from a range of backgrounds during your tutorials and project, or as an ambassador or PASS leader. The Manchester Leadership Programme (MLP) and any volunteering you undertake provide opportunities to work within the local community, which is also diverse.
Leadership skills	Proven ability to lead a team effectively.	You may have the opportunity to act as a leader in a tutorial assignment or project, or as a senior ambassador. You can also seek leadership opportunities in the MLP or as a PASS Leader.
Numeracy	Being able to work with numbers is a key skill and may range from basic mental arithmetic to being able to analyse and interpret data.	Data Handling modules, practicals, field courses and projects will help you develop your numerical skills and ability to use statistics. Numerical skills are required in practicals and experimental reporting to work out concentrations and dilutions, and to calculate whether results are statistically significant.
Presentation skills	Proven ability to communicate your ideas both visually and orally.	You will undertake presentations in tutorials, field courses and as part of your final year project. Becoming an ambassador, PASS leader or student representative gives you further opportunity to develop your presentation skills.
Project management	Project management requires effective planning, and management of resources to bring about the successful completion of specific project objectives.	Your final year project will be the main opportunity to develop this skill, but you may also manage smaller projects in some lecture units, within the MLP, or as a PASS leader or PASS co-ordinator.
Problem solving	Grasp what needs to be done and reach a satisfactory solution to a problem.	Tutorials will include practice of problem solving in preparation for data handling in practical write-ups and the final year programme specific problem paper.
Self-awareness	Know what your skills, strengths and weaknesses are. Think of examples of how and when you have demonstrated these.	When you have completed a task (e.g. formal presentation, essay, exam) reflect on your performance. Write examples and state what you intend to do differently next time.
Self-management (ability to manage learning)	Effectively manage your time and complete work within deadlines.	Most units will require you to manage your time and submit assignments to deadlines. Your final year project will hone this skill, and will need to fit around other demands on your time such as coursework essays and reading for lecture units.
Self-esteem & confidence	Belief in your capabilities to achieve a goal or an outcome effectively. If you have a strong sense of self efficacy you are more likely to challenge yourself with difficult tasks and be intrinsically motivated.	You will have the opportunity to rise to the challenges provided by completing independent work to deadlines (e.g. dissertation) and to learn from constructive criticism and feedback (e.g. peer review in tutorials; discussion groups and feedback from tutor or project supervisor).
Teamwork	Proven ability to work well within a team AND an understanding of the role you take within a team.	Most projects and tutorial activities involve some teamwork, as do some final year lecture units. Aim to take on different roles so that you experience as many as possible. Reflect on your strengths and development needs.
Research skills	This may refer to researching literature, searching databases, identifying appropriate resources and extracting key information or may refer to practical scientific research. Research is also an important skill when looking for and applying for jobs.	You should do extra reading around your lectures including reading recent primary literature and review articles. More extensive research will be required for essays, your dissertation and literature review. Your main opportunity for research will be during your final year project.
Written Communication	Effectively organising your ideas and communicating these in a coherent manner. Being able to use correct spelling, grammar and punctuation.	Throughout your degree you will develop your written communication skills through your assignments such as essays, dissertation and project write ups.

For further help see http://www.careers.manchester.ac.uk/experience/skills/ The “Develop your skills” section contains ideas on how to develop these skills beyond your degree (plus guidance on how recruiters assess for them).

The My Learning Essentials training programme offers careers advice through face–to-face workshops and online resources.

Appendix 2: Semester 1 Posters

Poster displays are an important means of presenting research findings at scientific meetings. They provide an opportunity for direct interaction and discussion with other conference attendees, allowing exchange of ideas. As part of the tutorial programme you will prepare a group poster for presentation in Semester 1 Week 10. Presentations will be made during an online tutorial. Tutors will nominate exceptional presentations or presentations where students have made an exceptional effort to be judged by a panel of academics with prizes to be won.

Aims

The purpose of this assignment is to develop team skills and presentation skills by designing a poster to illustrate and describe a current scientific topic.

Objectives

In completing this exercise, you will acquire expertise in:

using a variety of information sources to construct the poster e.g. journals, internet, etc;
collaborating with others and working in a group; and
presenting scientific information in a concise, organised and attractive way.

What makes a good poster?

It should:

have visual impact;
retain the reader’s attention;
be interesting, topical and stimulating: e.g. a current, high profile scientific issue;
be accurate: do not use dubious sources of information; be sure information is correct;
be easy to read with a clear, large font. Avoid crowded tables and over-long figure legends; and
include your names and degree programme.

You should be as creative as possible –Try and think of visual ways of displaying the information you want to convey. Don’t rely on large blocks of text.

Poster preparation guidelines

You should make sure:

Your poster is produced as a single PowerPoint slide (or equivalent) in landscape format
Titles, text, images etc. should be added in such a way to be visually appealing and to give a logical flow of information
Text is large enough to be read clearly (8pt for main text, 14-18pt for headers and 18-24pt for main title)
Any images/drawings/photos you use are of a high enough resolution to display clearly, between 150dpi and 300dpi is recommended
You have copyright to use any images you put on your poster

Poster Assessment

Your Academic Tutor will mark posters based on the following criteria: quality of science, visual impact, organisation of information, readability and contribution of the whole group. All members of the group should put an approximately equal effort into the poster production and will normally be given the same mark. However, if anyone puts in considerably more or less effort than average, their mark may be adjusted accordingly. All students in the group are expected to be able to discuss the poster and answer questions about it.

Prizes

In addition to the individual poster marks, prizes will be awarded for the best posters (winner and runner-up) as voted by (i) academic judges from the Faculty of Biology Medicine and Health and (ii) students.

Any comments or queries about the Poster Event that cannot be answered by your Academic Tutor should be addressed to Sarah Finn-Sell.

Appendix 3: Group Based Learning (GBL) Tutorials

What happens in a GBL tutorial?

These are general guidelines for GBL tutorials, which may be modified at the discretion of your Academic Tutor. GBL tutorials are run by students and the Academic Tutor is the facilitator and does not take part, other than to provide guidance if needed. Further guidance on group work is available on the My Learning Essentials website.

A specific topic, short article from a journal or a research paper is chosen. In the first session students decide on the primary learning objectives of the topic and how they are going to go about researching these. This should be done using a wide variety of information resources focused on the primary literature.

At the second session (usually student-led; the Academic Tutor is not present) the group have a full detailed discussion of the topic, focusing on the primary learning objectives. During this session one of the students should act as chairperson. Students should also decide on how the material will be presented the following week to their Tutor. The final session is either a formal presentation of the topic to the Academic Tutor or a discussion of the topic between the Academic Tutor and students.

Attendance at all sessions is compulsory as a primary aim of GBL is to develop an awareness of teamwork skills and increase the knowledge base of the whole group. Non-attendance jeopardises the learning of all other group members as individuals. For this reason, recordings of attendance and minutes of meetings in the absence of the Academic Tutor must be taken and be open to review by the Academic Tutor at any time.

Guidelines for the running of GBL tutorials

A chairperson must be appointed at the beginning of each GBL to control the running of the discussion. Attendance must also be recorded.
Another student is appointed as secretary and should record the agreed learning objectives and email these to all members of the group.
All students should make a record of the agreed topics to be researched.
Group communication is essential and everyone in the group should have input (this is strongly dependent on the chairperson).
The sessions should cover set one-hour time periods. This helps to focus the group and develops time and resource management.
The research information should come from a range of sources (for example, primary literature, textbooks, internet, reviews, personal experience etc.).